You are inspiring, influencing, enlightening, challenging, changing, and creating action in your audience. Do not take that power lightly.

Don’t just take 5 or 10 minutes before your talk to write down your script. Doesn’t your audience deserve more?

At the very least you should do the following:

1. Have a clear objective for yourself. What do you want to be different after the talk than before?
2. Have a clear understanding of the audience’s expectations.
3. Know your message and key points inside and out. Don’t just read someone else’s notes. Know your “One thing” your message. And know the supporting points that the audience needs to hear to convince them of your objective. To convince them to take action.
4. Be clear on what you’ll ask the audience to do. Tell them.
5. Know the context of this conversation.
6. Practice, practice, practice.

You may think all of these things only takes 10 minutes, but are you really doing your best work? Is your outcome going to suffer because of your lack of respect for your creative time?